CTP Template: CD_DPS1 COLOURS Compact Disc Booklet: Double Page Spread CYAN MAGENTA Customer SIGNUMCLASSICS YELLOW Catalogue No. SIGCD070 BLACK Job Title SIGCD070 Booklet Page Nos. Stella Maris c CTP Template: CD_DPS1 COLOURS Compact Disc Booklet: Double Page Spread CYAN MAGENTA Customer SIGNUMCLASSICS YELLOW Catalogue No. SIGCD070 BLACK Job Title SIGCD070 Booklet Page Nos. ALL THE ENDS OF THE EARTH ALSO on signumclassics 1. All the Ends of the Earth Judith Weir [8.48] 2. Kyrie eleison Anonymous, c. 1000 [3.19] 3. Sint lumbi James Weeks [4.26] 4. Vir perfecte Anonymous, 13th century [7.17] 5. Salve Regina Bayan Northcott [5.54] 6. Gemma nitens Anonymous, 14th century [3.08] 7. Stabant autem iuxta crucem Michael Finnissy [2.44] 8. Quam pulchra es John Dunstaple (d.1453) [2.31] 9. Alma Redemptoris Mater Bayan Northcott [4.55] 10. Alma Redemptoris Mater Sarum plainchant with discant [2.05] 11. Sanctus (Missa Canonica) Robin Holloway [3.10] 12. Agnus Dei (Missa Canonica) Robin Holloway [2.39] 13. Stella maris Anonymous, 14th century [3.14] Songs of Angels SIGCD038 Anthems for the 21st Century SIGCD059 Cantos Sagrados SIGCD508 14. O Jesu, Nomen Dulce Jonathan Harvey [4.34] 15. Mater ora filium Anonymous, 14th century [1.09] An inspired collection of music that was either No less than nine new commissions are on this In his choral music James Macmillan 16. Thomas, Jewel of Canterbury Gabriel Jackson [8.36] sung at Magdalen College or written by Magdalen extraordinary release from the Vasari Singers on characteristically draws inspiration for his 17. Campanis cum cymbalis Anonymous, 14th century [1.25] composers between 1480 and 1560. which all tracks are world premiere recordings. vocal works from recurring themes such as the Celebrating their 25th anniversary, Anthems for Catholic Church and Scottish traditional the 21st Century features the work of Dove, culture. Works on this disc include: Cantos Total Time Composers featured on this disc are: Davy, Mason, [71.12] Rathbone, Todd, Filsell, Clucas, Barlow, Sagrados, The Gallant Weaver and Christus Jacquet of Mantua, Preston, Appleby, and Jackson, MacMillan, Moore, Blackford, Bignold Vincit (1994). three pieces by Sheppard. and Swingle. The Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge GeofFrey Webber, DIRECTOR www.signumrecords.com William Towers, Countertenor Available through most record stores and at www.signumrecords.com. For more information call +44 (0) 20 8997 4000 www.signumrecords.com - 23 - CTP Template: CD_DPS1 COLOURS Compact Disc Booklet: Double Page Spread CYAN MAGENTA Customer SIGNUMCLASSICS YELLOW Catalogue No. SIGCD070 BLACK Job Title SIGCD070 Booklet Page Nos. ALL THE ENDS OF THE EARTH AN INTRODUCTION replaced by if not a torrent then certainly a steady stream of compositions written under medieval influence. A deliberately large This recording celebrates the vibrant relationship that has and diverse group of contemporary composers has been included in developed in recent years between contemporary sacred British this recording, though several other established figures such as choral music and the music of the medieval era, allowing several Thomas Adès and Diana Burrell might also have been chosen. The works composed in recent years to be heard alongside the type of catalyst for the new trend was the increasing availability of music that inspired their creation. Some of these relationships are medieval music, both as a result of the work of scholars and very close, where composers have drawn on a particular medieval editors, such as those involved in Polyphonic Music of the work or school of composition, whilst others reflect a more general Fourteenth Century (1956-85) and of recording artists, notably influence. Two motets have been composed specially for the David Munrow’s Early Music Consort of London, whose brilliant recording; most of the medieval works have been freshly edited, collection Music of the Gothic Era appeared in 1976. More recently and there are new reconstructions of music from the Winchester specialist groups such as Gothic Voices and the Orlando Consort Troper and of the tradition of improvised discant based have commissioned new music to stand alongside their core on plainsong. repertoire. Bayan Northcott’s Ave Regina celorum, the first-written of his Four Votive Antiphons - of which two others are included on At the beginning of the last century English composers of church this recording - was commissioned and premiered at the 1987 music began to look back to the renaissance period for inspiration, Cheltenham Festival by Gothic Voices. Northcott wrote as follows: finding a welcome release from the style of the day through a “Having long admired the supreme accomplishment of Christopher Recorded in the Lady Chapel of Ely Cathedral in P 2006 The copyright in this recording is owned by Signum Records Ltd. rekindling of the workings of modality and counterpoint. Settings of Page’s Gothic Voices in Medieval music, I was thrilled to be offered September 2004 by kind permission of the Dean and Chapter. C 2006 The copyright in this CD booklet, notes and design is owned by Signum Records Ltd. the Mass Ordinary by composers such as Herbert Howells (1912), their first contemporary commission”. But if this music is Producer - Thomas Hewitt Jones Any unauthorised broadcasting, public performance, copying or re-recording of Signum Compact Charles Wood (1922/3) and Ralph Vaughan Williams (1921) were essentially soloistic and specialist in conception, other composers Engineer - Edward Bainton Discs constitutes an infringement of copyright and will render the infringer liable to an action by beacons in this new development which persisted as a small but were happy to work more in the mainstream world of choral music. law. Licences for public performances or broadcasting may be obtained from Phonographic Assistant Engineer - Hugh Conway distinctive thread in English church music throughout the century. This is true of most of Gabriel Jackson’s output, and the success of Editor - Thomas Hewitt Jones Performance Ltd. All rights reserved. No part of this booklet may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval The use of medieval rather than renaissance music as a direct his approach was recognised by the award given to his motet O Artwork and design - Woven Design system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording Photograph of Geoffrey Webber - Yao Liang or otherwise, without prior permission from Signum Records Ltd. source of inspiration began to emerge in the second half of the Doctor optime in the liturgical category of the inaugural British All other Photography - Caius College Choir century, but at first only sporadically. Peter Maxwell Davies was a Composer Awards in 2003, a work commissioned by Caius College SignumClassics, Signum Records Ltd., Suite 14, 21 Wadsworth Road, Perivale, notable pioneer; his early interest in the music of John Taverner was Choir for a BBC broadcast of Sunday Worship on Radio 4 in March www.signumrecords.com Middx UB6 7JD, UK +44 (0) 20 8997 4000 E-mail: [email protected] followed by a pursuit of medieval English music in particular, and that year. But many neo-medieval compositions work well for either his carol settings of the 1960s follow precisely the form and solo or choral forces, whilst others contain an effective technique of the fifteenth-century English carol. But by the end of juxtaposition of the two sonorities, as in Michael Finnissy’s Seven the century such isolated pockets of medievalism came to be Sacred Motets of 1993. This contrast also appears to be implied by - 22 - - 3 - CTP Template: CD_DPS1 COLOURS Compact Disc Booklet: Double Page Spread CYAN MAGENTA Customer SIGNUMCLASSICS YELLOW Catalogue No. SIGCD070 BLACK Job Title SIGCD070 Booklet Page Nos. some music of the early medieval period in particular, in which part-music, and this recording has been made in one of the finest plainsong alternates with part-music, as in the organum Vir late-medieval buildings of this type, the free-standing Lady Chapel perfecte, though it is not possible to be certain about whether at Ely Cathedral erected in the fourteenth century. Most of the individuals or groups of voices were intended to perform the chant contemporary works on the recording also benefit from this type of sections (or the part-music, for that matter). acoustic environment. Gabriel Jackson’s Thomas, Jewel of Canterbury, for example, builds on the dissonant effects created by listening to The various contemporary composers represented in this recording plainsong in a reverberant acoustic by composing lines of quasi- naturally take different points of departure, choosing to highlight plainsong which are sung out of time with one another. different aspects of medieval music, from plainsong and modal harmony in general to all aspects of part-music involving texture, geoffrey webber William Towers rhythm and structure. Concerning mode, Judith Weir chooses to preserve the modality of Perotin’s Viderunt omnes throughout All 1. All the Ends of the Earth (1999), Judith Weir (Chester Music) Geoffrey Webber began his musical education as a chorister at William Towers read English at Gonville & Caius College, the ends of the earth, including only a few B flats in the Lydian All the Ends of the Earth was commissioned by the BBC for a Salisbury Cathedral, and after being Music Scholar at The King’s Cambridge and studied as a postgraduate scholar at the Royal mode on F, just as appear in the plainsong itself. Robin Holloway’s Europe-wide radio broadcast on Millennium Day, 1st January, 2000, School, Worcester he was elected to an Organ Scholarship at New Academy of Music. In his first year after leaving the Academy he Missa Canonica is subtitled ‘Missa bianca’ since not a single black and is based on Pérotin’s organum Viderunt Omnes, composed College, Oxford, in 1977. At Oxford his academic tutors and organ featured extensively as a soloist in Sir John Eliot Gardiner’s Bach note appears in the entire composition.